Justice

The World Day Against Trafficking on Monday has passed, but trafficking knows no calendar, and the need for vigilance continues. These days, I’m thinking a lot about clients I helped climb out of the human hell of trafficking.

This summer, I retired after 15 years of the most gratifying ministry I’ve ever had. I worked for the Immigration Law Program of Legal Services of Eastern Missouri in St. Louis, which provides free legal representation for poor people. I represented hundreds of immigrants who needed help applying for immigration benefits.

Two small and little-known organizations in St. Louis have given me pause to reflect on how good grows from goodness.

The Immigrant and Refugee Women’s Program, housed in an Episcopal church’s parish hall basement, provides English teachers for immigrant and refugee women as they learn to navigate American culture and the English language.

The women who staff the program are competent, compassionate, caring, and concerned about their students and teachers. Each teacher is matched with a student and provided with the trademark teacher’s bag full of notebooks,

We, the Adorers of the Blood of Christ, U.S. Region, have been appalled, dismayed and disheartened by our government’s new policy of separating undocumented adults and their children at our southwestern border.

After a lapse of 25 years, the Adorers of the Blood of Christ officially reinstate our mission in the west African country.

Sister Therese Wetta from Wichita, Kan., and Sister Zita Resch from Schaan in Liechtenstein will arrive in the capital of Monrovia tonight. They will start a new adventure in a place from which we were torn so brutally a quarter of a century ago.

Invited in the 1970s by a persistent missionary priest, a handful of Adorers traveled to Liberia to staff schools,

The Adorers are disappointed that the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania determined on Sept. 28 that it did not have jurisdiction to hear the claims they filed against Transcontinental Gas Pipe Line (Transco) and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act.

The Adorers’ claims arise out of Transco’s decision to condemn the Sisters’ property in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, to construct its Atlantic Sunrise pipeline to transport fossil fuels being extracted through fracking.

At issue in this case is the Adorers’ deeply held religious belief that the Earth is God’s creation.

On Friday, Sept. 15, the city of St. Louis erupted in protests after a judge acquitted a white, former St. Louis police officer of first-degree murder in the shooting death of a black man in 2011.

While most of the protests were peaceful by day, once darkness fell, some demonstrators resorted to violence and destruction of property in some city and inner-ring suburban neighborhoods. On Saturday, the city block where I live had its annual block party, and it was a scene of calm, neighborliness, and fun on a warm September evening.

Our Sisters have plenty to say about President Trump’s recent decision to rescind DACA — Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals — that protected hundreds of thousands of young immigrants who were brought to the United States illegally as children. The matter is now left to Congress, but with hurricane relief, tax reform and everything else on its plate, can Congress act in time?

On Tuesday, President Trump rescinded a government program known as DACA — Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals — that protected hundreds of thousands of young immigrants who were brought to the United States illegally as children. Sister Cecilia Marie Hellmann, ASC, who worked with immigrants as coordinator for the Diocese of Belleville, Ill., Office of Hispanic Ministry for 16 years, shares her thoughts.

By Sister Cecilia Marie Hellmann, ASC

On July 29, a young woman who has DACA status shared her story with more than 100 persons gathered at our center in Ruma,

The Adorers are disappointed with the recent decision of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania allowing Transco to take immediate possession of their property, even though Transco has not yet obtained all of the permits and approvals that it requires to commence construction of the Atlantic Sunrise Pipeline.

The Adorers continue to pursue their independent claim that the use of their property for the Atlantic Sunrise Pipeline would violate their right to religious exercise as protected by the Religious Freedom Restoration Act.

Adorers of the Blood of Christ, U.S. Region, Allege Violation of Religious Freedom Restoration Act

The Adorers of the Blood of Christ, U.S. Region, an order of Catholic sisters with regional offices in St. Louis, filed a complaint today, July 14, 2017, in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, seeking an injunction to stop a pipeline from running through their property in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania.

The Adorers, whose religious practice includes protecting and preserving creation, which they believe is a revelation of God, allege that the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and its Commissioner,

About Us

We are the Adorers of the Blood of Christ, a vowed religious community of Roman Catholic women who were founded in 1834 as a teaching order by the Italian, St. Maria De Mattias, in the small town of Acuto Italy. Worldwide, we are 2,000 women strong, including 200+ in the U.S.